I dropped to all fours, exhausted. Blood filled one eye, and there was a ringing in my ears, but I was alive. When Billy Ray wouldn’t quit with his crying, I crawled over to him and with barely any air left in me, I sent him to sleep with an angry smack to the head.
Leaning back on my heels, I looked skywards. My lungs gasped hungrily for air. Every nerve and fiber in my body ached. Blood dripped from my mouth, my nose, and a deep cut through my eyebrow. It spilled into my eye and trickled through the dust and dirt on my face.
Ignoring the pain, I went to stand but was sent lurching forward into the dirt by a fucking hard kick to the back.
Rolling over with a groan, I looked up, and the last thing I saw before everything went black was a pair of menacing eyes and a face half concealed by a skull bandana.
CASSIDY
“Please,” I begged. “Don’t do this.”
My pleas were forced out with so much emotion they were nothing more than a wheeze.
But Barrett only laughed at me. He pushed me up against the wall and held me there with his body, pressing his palm against my throat. He leaned closer so I had no choice but to feel the heat of his breath on my cheek. “Hurting you is what I live for.”
His eyes roved over me, soulless and full of evil. But there was also a burning fire in them. A dark light so hot and needy and raging with lust.
I didn’t know where we were. A warehouse somewhere. He’d made me drive for miles before we pulled up outside the abandoned building. I didn’t know what was going to happen, only that it was bad.
“You’re the only thing in this world that drives me crazy,” he moaned, his voice low and husky. Aroused. When he pressed his hips into mine and I felt the hardness of his erection, my strangled sob burst from my lips and died in the space between us. “I’ve missed you,” he breathed desperately. “I’ve missed you so much.”
“Let me go,” I pleaded.
His eyes glittered over my face. “I can never let you go again. Do you know what torture it’s been? Waiting. Wanting. Needing to see you. Smell you.” He drew in a deep breath as if he was capturing my scent to memory. Then his hand slid between my thighs. “Touch you.”
“Please,” I sobbed.
“I love you,” he whispered against my lips.
With a yank, he ripped open my jeans and shoved them down to my hips. I knew what he was looking for. His initial. The one he branded into me when I was twelve.
“It’s still there,” he breathed out. He raised his head to look at me again, and a triumphant smile curled on his lips. “See. You belong to me.”
He kissed me then. Hard and rough. His hands holding my face still so I couldn’t turn away from him, his moan torturing me just as much as his tongue and mouth did. I bit down on his bottom lip and tasted the coppery taste of blood on my tongue. But this only turned him on more. He laughed against my lips. “Do it again, sweet Chelsea. Oh baby, do it to me again.”
Sick fuck.
He went for another kiss. But I brought my knee up and got him right in the balls. He growled and stumbled backward, the pain registering on his face before slowly morphing into anger. He stormed forward and whipped his hand across my cheek then squeezed my chin. His eyes glowed with anger and evil. And madness.
“Why do you always have to fight me? Why don’t you understand that you are mine?” His fingers tightened on my chin and I winced. “What’s it going to take to stop you from running away from me?”
He smashed his lips to mine. Hard and mean. But the sudden rap on the door ended the kiss abruptly.
“What?” He barked over his shoulder.
The door opened and a man with a skull bandana hanging around his neck appeared in the doorway.
“It’s done,” he said. “He is in the warehouse.”
Barrett let the information register and then smiled. “Excellent. I can take it from here.”
The man looked at me and then back to Barrett. There was hesitation before he added, “You should know, Clint and Billy Joe are in the hospital. He fucked them up pretty bad.”
Barrett shook his head with a chuckle. “Of course he did.” He gestured to the man. “Leave.”
The door closed and Barrett turned back to me. “Looks like it’s showtime.”
“What have you done?”
He smiled evilly. “You’ll find out soon enough, sweet Chelsea.”
“If you’ve hurt him…”
His head snapped in my direction, and he glared at me, his face bright with rage. He thrust me up against the wall again, his gloved hand crushing my throat. “He touched what wasn’t his to touch, and now I’m going to make him pay. But the best thing about this is making you watch while I destroy him.” He leaned in so close his lips were almost touching mine. “Killing him quickly won’t be an option. Be ready. This is going to be torture.”